Can PeerPerks Identify Your Network's Worth

"Get rewarded for being social" is the slogan of PeerPerks, a new service recently launched by social media influence ranker PeerIndex. Less than a month after PeerIndex has extended its offering by providing insights into the topical influence of a user, PeerPerks is the next step of the company to make "social influence" an actual good.

"Helping consumers benefit from their personal data and to help marketers achieve authentic word-of-mouth at scale." is the goal of Azeem Azhar, CEO of PeerIndex. In order to fulfill on that promise, PeerPerks identifies "word-of-mouth advocates" and gives them early access to special perks, with the hope that this will reflect positively in their future online communication.

For its launch, PeerPerks has offers like a free premium subscription for Deezer, organic chocolate from AbesMarket, a £50 discount at fashion boutique Lookk, and tickets to the premiere of documentary "The Price of Kings". Some of this perks are only available in certain regions e.g. AbesMarket's offer just applies in the U.S., while Lookk only offers the discounts to U.K. residents.

So what does a user need to do, in order to claim one of these PeerPerks? For that the user clicks on one of the available perks and authenticates with his Twitter or Facebook account. PeerIndex then uses its internal secret sauce to determine whether or not the user qualifies for the given perk. Most of the time smaller perks are still available, even if the user is judged not influential enough.

PeerPerks, in its nature fairly similar to Klout Perks, is an effort to change the relationship between influencers and markets. It will be interesting to observe what effects this kind of advertising will have on the social media landscape, and how PeerPerks and Klout Perks will find their respective niche.